History Black knight was designed to test the reentry of warheads
for Britain's nuclear missile Blue
Streak.

Black knight was able lift a 70 kg model warhead
above the atmosphere and then send it back towards the earth with a speed
up to 19,000 km/h.

It was equipped with a four chambered gamma 201
engine. The gamma engine burned kerosene with hydrogen peroxide. The gamma
engines was in many ways derivatives of the rocket engines developed by
the Germans in second world war for me 163 and me 262 rocket planes. After
the war German and British scientist worked together developing a variety
of rocket engines.

The first Black Knight was launched September
7, 1958 from Woomera in Australia. The model presented here is t launched
march 12, 1959. It was a test-vehicle lacking the second stage.

Later versions was equipped with an invented Cuckoo
1b solid rocket, that propelled the warhead towards the earth.

After the cancellation of Blue
Streak in 1960 Black knight still was in use until 1965 in the joint
US, UK and Australian Gaslight and Dazzle test-programs.

It was suggested to develop a space launcher based on
a Blue Streak first stage and Black Knight second stage. This project was
called black prince. It never left the drawing board. Instead Blue streak
became the first stage in the Europa Rocket and Black knight was developed
into Black Arrow.